Beginning at the End
by Steff ODonnell
Summary: Max saves the world but at what cost?
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer- Maximum Ride is a creation of James Patterson; I highly recommend reading his books

Maximum Ride

Beginning from the End

Chapter I- At the End

The heat was unbearable, my skin felt like it was crawling under the sweat, blood and dirt. The smoke was so thick and clouds of it rolled through the air all around me, and I was surrounded. It was thick and black, dry and hot, nothing like real clouds, I would know. I couldn't see well and it was getting harder to breathe, all I could think of were my family, where were they? Did they get away in time? Or were they still here somewhere, where I couldn't find them? I tried to call out to see if anyone would answer me, to make sure no one else was still trapped here in this inferno, all I managed was a painful squeak turning into a coughing fit. My eyes were burning, tearing up but the tears were evaporating before it could help. I knew I was running out of time, and I still had a job to do. I looked around wildly, trying to get my bearings straight, I knew I was somewhere over a grated catwalk but I wasn't sure what to do next.

I was getting tired, I knew I couldn't last too much longer, but I had to finish this once and for all. There, I break in the smoke below me. I took my chance and dove for it. The closer I got to the ground, the hotter it got, the more uncomfortable I was. I shook my head; I didn't have time to think about it, down, down, down faster, and faster. I figured I must have been going close to 350 clicks, had to have been, yet it just didn't feel fast enough. I wasn't going to make it. I was out below the rolling clouds of black smoke now.

*Go for the Reactor core* _Huh? Who said that? _I thought, pulling my feet up flames licking at the bottoms of my sneakers. I looked around, realizing it was the voice I sometimes heard when I was off track of what I was supposed to be doing. I realized it was the first time in a long while, that I'd heard it.

"Nice of you to join me" I muttered under my breath looking around, there below the catwalk, the reactor core. I flapped my wings hard a couple times and gave it everything I had left. Faster and faster, I needed to go faster. I brought my arms up over my head, hands together, spiralling faster then, I've ever flown before. Somewhere in the back of my brain, something just sort of clicked and I knew, I just knew I'd broken the sound barrier for the first time ( and quite possibly the last time) and my ears popped painfully. I cringed and clenched my teeth before shrieking at the top of my lungs, but I didn't stop. *This is it* came the voice again and then my brain started to shut down as I felt hard glass shattering all around me, cutting into my skin. I'd flown straight into the reactor core and out the other side, it seemed to take forever for a reaction, but it was only seconds later that a deafening blast radiated from the core. My wings crumpled as I was thrown hundreds of miles into the air, I felt all the wind whoosh out of my lungs and air sacs. I saw the world light up in bursts of yellow and orange and red, and then the world grew darker around me. I realized I was falling, which wouldn't be the first time I fell out of the air, just the first time from this height without anyone else around, I was falling and every important moment in my life seemed to flash behind my eyes, I felt the tears rolling down my face and all I could bring myself to think was how much I loved him and that I hoped the world was safe, because somehow I didn't think I was going to get to find out for myself. I was falling and the mix of hot and cold air was rushing up to meet me was oddly comforting after the blistering heat of the inferno I had started. The last thing I consciously remembered was his soft longish hair and his dark as midnight eyes, that half smile he seemed to have just for me. I was blacking out, I had no idea how far I'd been thrown, but I knew with absolute certainty that I would never feel myself hit the ground either. I was gone.

*You did it Max, The World will be Saved* I don't even remember hearing the voice clearly it was almost a whisper, but it was the last thing I heard. I was sure that I Maximum Ride, leader of the flock, and only 16 years old, 98% human 2% bird had just died...

The world shook as a new era swept in fast and violent, all around the planet, top secret facilities most of the populace didn't know about exploded, and multi-million dollar corporations collapsed everywhere. The world was rocked with wave after wave of devastation but ultimately the world had been saved, when the dust cleared and people around the world began picking up the pieces and putting their lives back together, there would be peace and better care of the one planet known to support humanity.

It had been nearly six weeks since everything had changed; things were starting to come bad on line now. He looked across the room at the computer screen blinking in the dark. It was the first time it had powered up and connected to anything since the world wide black out weeks before. He looked at it sideways from across the room, where he laid on his side on a lone mattress in the dark. He hadn't had the strength or the energy to get up from his mattress on the floor of the darkened basement he'd taken refuge in. He slowly sat up running his hand through his longish black hair, he rolled his shoulders painfully working the kinks out of his muscles, he tentatively shifted his wings a little bit, and the pain was still too much to try to move them much. He got to his feet walking slowly across the room to the computer blinking on the table by the door. He ran his fingers over the track pad and his e-mail popped up on the screen. One new message. He was about to close the window, not really wanting to respond to his blog yet, everything still hurt too much, it was all still to fresh in his mind, when he noticed the subject line. He clicked the open button.

To: Fang

Subject: Maximum Ride

I thought you should see this.

-A friend.

Fang scrolled down to the bottom of the page and saw two attached files. He opened the first, and the screen filled with images of the brown sun-streaked haired girl with the brown eyes that he loved more than anything in the world. There were images from points all through her life, as a child growing up, images of them together, of the flock all together, of her flying on her own. They were all mixed up, just random points of Max's life. Fang could feel his eyes tearing up before he even clicked the second file; the pictures were all of his Max. He opened the second attachment and a video played, it was grainy not very clear like it was a recorded feed of Max's final moments. Her last battle, he watched her gathering speed flying straight through the reactor core and thrown from the impending blast, the screen went black as he watched her falling from the sky.

Fang stood staring at the screen for a moment, he'd known what had happened of course, but he hadn't been there himself. He should have been but he wasn't, She'd made sure that he couldn't be. Max herself had made sure there was no way he could be anywhere near her when it came down to the end. He remembered all too clearly the last time he'd seen her. They were arguing, that seemed to be what they'd done best as of late, fight. Max had suddenly gone quiet in the middle of their last fight and let the argument go, before folding him in a hug.

"I love you Fang..." She'd whispered beside his ear before pulling back enough to kiss him soundly. He remembered his arms circling her slim waist, pulling her closer, and then the pain. The unbelievable pain. When she stepped back, he'd dropped to his knees, it just hurt so much. What had happened? He'd looked up at her clenching his teeth against the pain. There she was standing in front of him, holding his favourite switch blade, and his blood ran the entire length of the blade to drip onto the floor, she must have worked it out of his pocket.

"Max?"

"I'm sorry Fang; I just won't be able to do what I have to if you're there..." She said dropping the knife, he watched fall to the floor from her hand. "That's why you left me right, because we cared more about each other, then about anything else... I made some bad choices..." She said through tears, he'd made her cry again.

"Fang, I love you so much, but I have to save the world, right?" she said with a little laugh before turning and walking out the door.

Fang gave his head a shake clearing the memory away. He closed the top on the computer and walked back to his mattress. He lay back down careful to stay on his side. Max had driven his knife into his shoulder blade close to the base of his wing. She'd done it to keep him from coming after her. She knew better than anyone that the injury would heal fairly seamless, and relatively quickly. But if he'd gone after her and watched her die unable to save her, he'd never have recovered. That's why she was the leader, the real leader; she could make the hardest decisions in a snap. Fang put his head down and closed his eyes, trying to sleep a little. Sleep came a lot harder now than it ever did.

Fang had only just settled into a light sleep when he heard something vibrate. He listened for a moment and realized it was his cell phone. It wasn't the first time it had rang in the last couple weeks, but up till now he hadn't really moved a whole lot. He reached for his jacket on the floor beside him and dug through his pockets trying to find the vibrating contraption. One look at the call display and his heart near stopped as his breath caught in his throat

Fang remembered trying to go after Max, even after she had stabbed him.

"Max!" he yelled getting to his feet, she stopped in the doorway at the end of the hall, her back to him.

"Max, why?" he asked after a moment. She stayed to listen to him as he leaned heavily in the door frame.

"If I screw up, the world will end Fang." She said looking back at him, he reached out for her but she turned her back on him. "I'm sorry Fang, but I love you. More than anything in this world, that's why." She said quietly over her shoulder before disappearing through the door and up the stairs out of sight.

"Max, Max!" he tried again "Max, I love you..." He said crumpling in the hallway as he tried to flex his wings hoping she'd heard him.

Fang came back to reality as the phone vibrated in his hand again. The call display still showed Max's number. He flipped open the phone almost afraid of what he'd hear.

"Hello?" he asked quietly, his voice sounded rough even to him, from lack of use.

"Fang?" came the confused answer

"Yeah"

"Its Gazzy" came the surprised voice again

"Yeah"

"You must have been the last person to call Max. I found her phone dude! We're out here at the blast site, the flock that is, looking for clues man!" Fang was stunned, Gazzy had found Max's cell phone out at the blast site, and it was intact. This meant one thing; there was a chance she had made it out alive. Fang didn't answer Gazzy right away, he didn't trust his voice.

"So, uh, you comin' out to help us search some more? Or are you still on the Fang's bad for flock, thing?" Gazzy asked. Fang ran a hand through his hair scratching the back of his head

"Fang?"

"I can't Gasman"

"What do you mean you can't?" Gazzy exploded sounding outraged.

"I can't fly." Fang admitted after a moment, Gazzy was silent on the other end of the line. Fang tried to fluff his wings up a little and clenched his teeth against the pain.

"... You can't fly...?" Gazzy finally asked in a hushed voice not wanting anyone else to hear him.

"Max, she uh, she didn't want me to be able to follow her." Fang said after a minute, keeping his own voice low. Gazzy was silent again before asking his next question.

"When will you be here?"

"Maybe another week before I'll even be able to try, even then it'll be slow going." Fang admitted quietly feeling low. He'd been fighting with himself the last couple weeks about going out, but he wouldn't have even been able to walk without killing himself. Gazzy was quiet for a minute and Fang could hear Nudge yelling to Iggy in the background before a loud crash.

"I'll call you back in a little while, okay Fang?" Gazzy said after a minute had passed. Fang wanted nothing more than to be out there searching with or without the flock too. Then it dawned on him that there was something he could be doing.

"Yeah okay." Fang agreed after a second and hung up the phone. He sat in the dark for a moment. Gazzy had found Max's phone intact. Max always had her phone in her front jeans pocket; there was no way for it to just fall out without some effort on her part. So if it survived then there was a chance that she did too, and Fang planned to find her for better or worse. Fang got up and flipped open the computer again. He went over his e-mail again looking for anything that stuck out, and then started to search news bulletin after news bulletin, missing person's reports, emergency check in rosters, he searched for anything and everything that could possibly hold some answers. Then after some thought he opened his blog, deciding t make a post to see what others could find out.

Fangs Blog: Welcome

Visitor Number: Broken again

Location: Anywhere but here

Subject: Maximum Ride

Yo, I'm back after that brief worldwide black out we've seemed to have experienced. So how crazy was it? The apocalypse not have as much of a bang as anyone thought? Haha yeah right. The worlds impending doom was thwarted by none other than the amazing Maximum Ride! Let's hear it guys, give it up for the saviour of the world, Max!

Okay so now you know that Max really did save the world single handed, we all have to do our parts to keep it safe! See previous posts about global warming and air and water pollution.

Now Speaking of Max, no ones heard from her since taking on the big bad, we're starting to worry more then a little, this has been the longest that she's been away from the flock, so I would greatly appreciate any and all information you guys may have.

-Fang

Fang shut the computer off for the second time that day and decided he needed to make more of an effort. He needed to get up and work the kinks out of his muscles and eat, gotta fuel the body if he planned to do anything at all, anytime soon.

"I'm coming max." He muttered under his breath picturing her sun streaked hair, her warm brown eyes, her beautiful brown and white wings.

There was a chance to find her, for better or worse he was going to take that chance. He owed it to himself to find her and he owed it to her to do everything he could to find out what happened and if it was really over.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer- Maximum Ride is a creation of James Patterson; I highly recommend reading his books

Maximum Ride

Beginning from the End

Chapter II- Searching Desperately

I could hear something dripping fairly close to my head. Okay, I could hear again, this was a good thing, a very good thing. Now if only I could see again I'd be all set. I was lying on my stomach with one knee bent up kind of awkwardly; I couldn't really feel the other leg other then extreme pressure from my hip down, that couldn't be good. Whatever I was laying on was cold, wet, hard and rather unforgiving; something sharp was poked into my shoulder and my stomach. I could feel one arm lying across my lower back sort of uncomfortably. Not painfully exactly, just kind of numb. My whole body was numb now that I thought about it. How'd that happen? Where was I for that matter? How'd I get here? I was still hearing something dripping by my head, it must have been water. I could feel the cold wet droplets splashing up into my face and rolling down my cheek towards the ground beneath me, but the world was still dark, and I couldn't see where the source of the water was or where it was going. I couldn't see anything but pitch blackness. Uh oh, had I damaged my eyes?

I couldn't move any part of my body, no matter how hard I tried; I couldn't move my head or wiggle my toes. Nothing was cooperating with me at all. Oh man, maybe I was dead... Oh not good, not good at all. No use panicking but I had to think. I was sure there was something I was supposed to be doing, something important, really, really important, only I couldn't remember what it was that was so important. I tried to wiggle my fingers again, nothing, lift my head, nothing, shift my weight a little, nope still nothing. I couldn't even seem to blink my eyes, for all intensive purposes I had decided that I appeared to be dead; all I needed now was to wake up floating above my body or something. Man, this sucks.

Nearly a week had passed; Gazzy had called again just as he said he would. They had found Max's back, it was in rough shape, that was about all they'd found but they'd also admitted they weren't sure what they were looking for exactly. Iggy had assumed the leader role since he was the oldest, but being blind had its draw backs when a couple kids need you to look out for them and make group decisions.

A couple of bloggers had sent messages in answer to his post about Max, but nothing particularly helpful. There was one message where someone had thought they'd seen Max in Germany, but after following it up Fang had found out that it was Maya not Max who had gone to Germany, so he was right back to where he started. With nothing but a mysterious video of Max, and a blast zone he had yet to make it too. Fang ran a hand through his hair in frustration, he was busy packing the few things he had into his backpack, he picked up the switch blade max had stabbed him with, he'd since cleaned it, and put it into his jeans pocket.. Fang shrugged into his jacket and looked around the small dark room he'd been living in for the last couple weeks. He'd decided that whether he was ready or not, today was the day he was flying out to ground zero to begin his own search or Max, and meet up with the flock. He hadn't decided to stay with the flock yet, but he did need to meet with them and make sure they were okay; Max would never forgive him if something serious had happened to them while he did nothing about it.

Fang left his dark little safe haven and for the first time in weeks opened his wings to their full fifteen foot wingspan stretching his muscles out carefully. He was still sore, but the pain was bearable as he launched himself into the air with a running leap.

Fang landed close to the blast site nearly four hours later, the going had been slow; he'd had to stop every hour or so to rest. He knew he really shouldn't be putting the kind of strain on his wings and back that flying caused just yet, the injury wasn't fully healed yet. He hated that he couldn't fly properly but knew he had to make a decent effort anyway. Being that he'd landed as close as he did, Fang decided to walk the rest of the way to where the flock was waiting for him, giving his aching wings a rest. The sun over head was beating down hot and the earth was warm through his boots with each step he took through the dust. A shadow passed over head and Fang looked up to see a very familiar bird kid coming in for a landing, he watched the shape in the sky get larger and larger by the second. A moment later his old red-headed friend Iggy stood before him.

"Come to finally help?"

"Yeah, what have you found Iggy?" Fang asked walking slowly, Iggy walked beside him and Fang noticed that his usually pale buddy had quite the tan going on.

"The Gasman found Max's phone the other day, but you knew that. I found her backpack the next day; Nudge says it's in pretty rough shape though. We haven't stopped looking yet, but we're running out of plausible places to look." Iggy said filling Fang in, he nodded before remembering that he had to tell Iggy what he was thinking.

"Yeah, okay." Fang agreed processing the information Iggy had just given him.

"So what took you so long? Gasman just said you couldn't fly, were you buried or something?"

"Something." Fang said stopping in mid stride, Iggy stopped just in front of him when Fang grabbed his sleeve."Iggy, don't tell the others what really kept me from coming okay? We don't need them thinking that Max could hurt any of them if she had to." Fang said his eyes searching Iggy's for some reaction. Fang was positive that Max would never hurt any of the rest of the flock, it was just him, he'd left her, and hurt her and that gave her the strength to do what she had to. Iggy's eyes widened in surprise unable to see what Fang was saying.

"Max hurt you?" he asked keeping his voice low, not sure how close they were to the rest of the flock.

"Yeah, I didn't really give her a choice when I saw her last, so she knifed me. I would have gone after her otherwise. I tried to anyway." Fang explained, Iggy reached for Fangs wing wordlessly, Fang let him brush his fingers along the length coming down to his right shoulder blade, he felt Iggy's fingers hit the slightly raised scar line at the base of his wing, and knew that Iggy felt Fang flinch under his hand.

"Holy Cow, Max did this?" Iggy asked bewildered his hand still on Fang's back.

"It was my own fault. I left her no choice. It's what took me so long to get here though. I couldn't fly with it the way it was hell I couldn't do much with the way it was for weeks, not without bleeding on something anyway. Its bearable now and the bleedings stopped. But I still can't fly for long." Fang admitted after a moment before taking a few steps forward to continue the way towards the others. Iggy kept pace easily enough.

"What are you planning to tell Nudge and Gasman? They will ask about it." Iggy said after a moment of thinking about what Fang had just told him.

"Same thing I already told Gazzy on the phone the first time he called. Max didn't want me to follow her."

"Yeah like Max voicing her opinion would ever stop you."

"Max and I were fighting the last time I saw her, I woke up in the dark after the argument, she was gone and the building came down around me while I was out."

"Yeah, that they'll believe. We all witnessed you and Max fight before, the knock down fist fights that occurred on the occasion."

"Yeah, so that's my story and I'm sticking to it." Fang said sarcastically remembering all too clearly how hard Max's right hook could be.

"You sound like her." Iggy accused. They walked the rest of the way to where the other kids had set up a makeshift camp in silence.

"Oh my god, Fang! How are you? I'm alright. Well not great, cause of Max missing and oh wow, you look tired, was it a long trip? Are you hungry?"

"Nudge let him breathe." Iggy said cutting off the ever babbling Nudge. She sort of flushed pink under her tan, offering up a sympathetic smile.

"Fang" Gazzy greeted with a wave.

"Hey guys. I've been better Nudge, thanks." Fang greeted what was left of the flock sitting down on a chunk of rubble under the make shift awning that kept the sun off their heads. The next few moments were spent catching up on small things that had happened since the last time they'd seen each other, while Fang took a few moments to rest before doing anything else. He could tell that it was going to be a long afternoon.

"How about someone shows me where Max's phone and backpack were found." Fang suggested looking out around the camp. The immediate blast area was easily a couple miles in all directions. He needed a place to start to try to piece some of this together.

"Yeah, I'll show you." Gazzy said getting to his feet, as Nudge lay down on a blanket in the shade beside Iggy.

Gasman lead Fang away from the camp and around the edge of the impact crater that was at the center of the blast zone, Fang glanced over the edge as they skirted around the lip watching their footing. It was easily a couple hundred feet deep, no problem for one of them to fly in and out of.

"Has anyone been down there yet?" Fang asked

"No, the day we found Max's phone, we sort of decided that the crater wasn't as important and explored further out, expanding our search radius around where we found her things." Gazzy explained still walking, Fang nodded, making note that someone would have to go down and thoroughly search the crater properly, and it would probably be him to do it. If nothing else they were going to need to know if it was stable.

Gazzy stopped by a long clear track through the dirt and rubble, easily two feet wide by fifteen long. It looked as though someone cleared the space here.

"Found Max's backpack here." Gazzy said indicating a large rock at the start of the cleared space, then pointed in the direction following the track in the dirt. "Her phone was about twenty feet or so that way." Fang squatted down in the dirt, looking hard at the cleared track for a few minutes; he noticed some dark discoloration in small random patches. Gazzy watched him quietly wondering what Fang was thinking. Unfortunately Gazzy's curiosity got the better of him.

"What are you thinking Fang?"

"I think something fairly heavy 80, maybe 90lbs or so, was dragged across here." Fang muttered more to himself then to Gazzy but he'd heard all the same, the flock all had super hearing and picked up most things other people couldn't.

"You think she was here, and someone else found her and dragged her off?" Gasman asked his eyes getting wide at the thought. Fang looked up at him.

"Maybe, I don't know" Fang said after a moment, he got up and slowly walked along the track in the dirt, in the direction Gazzy had pointed.

Gazzy left Fang alone staring off into the dirt and rubble after awhile to give him some time to think. He went back to camp to get out of the sun. Fang would have some new idea of what to do next. He always did, that was why Max had always listened to him.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer- Maximum Ride is a creation of James Patterson; I highly recommend reading his books

Maximum Ride

Beginning from the End

Chapter III- Over, and Over Again

I tried again and again to move, even just a little, but as it had been for hours, possibly days, I had no luck. My whole body was still tingling with numbness where anything was touching me. The pressure had decreased exponentially in my leg, but my feet were completely frozen with cold and it was slowly ebbing up my legs towards my hips. This was truly beginning to worry me, mostly because if I was already dead I shouldn't be feeling any of this, unless of course I was reliving my death, which was a rather depressing thought. I knew there was running water near here somewhere, I could hear it, and it was all I could hear mind you. I could hear it dripping, pooling on the ground here somewhere. I now had the sinking feeling that it was actually pooling underneath me and slowly rising. I'd already long since realized that wherever I was and whatever it's that I was lying on was by no means flat or level. The water had already risen so that it was knee deep and creeping steadily higher up my body. If I hadn't been in trouble before, I most certainly was now, and it was going to get worse long before it got any better. I was cold, wet, and numb all over, couldn't move if my life depended on it, and at this point it just might. I couldn't see, I could barely hear, and I'm pretty sure that what little I could hear it was because of the absolute stillness and silence aside from the water I was surrounded with.

Strangely enough, I was beyond panicking, there really was no point in that, and thinking about panicking has never ever been remotely helpful at any time, in any way. At least not that I could think of. I had the feeling that based on my current situation, I must have found myself in some pretty panic inducing situations over the span of my life, if this was the conclusion I was coming up with. Particularly, when at any time, over the next few hours, possibly days, I had no idea how long I'd been here, I could drown and no one would ever know. This was of course if I wasn't already dead.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. I couldn't remember my life! I didn't know a damn thing about who I was. Uh oh. This couldn't be good. Why didn't I know who I was or how I wound up in this situation? I must have had a life before I wound up here, or maybe I was only just starting a new life. I had absolutely no clue, and this bothered me more than the fact that I was probably going to drown in here. How old was I? What did I look like? Did I have any friends? A family maybe? Just who the hell was I? What... What was my name? If I was going to die here I thought that maybe I should know my own name. Then in the same instant that I realized I knew nothing, I also realized that it really didn't matter about any of those things, because the fact was I was trapped here, in limbo, somewhere between life and death, with no way out...

As the sun set far off in the distance and the heat of the day cooled into evening Fang stood on the edge of a fairly deep ravine. He'd been out in the sun all afternoon on the verge of revelation, which never seemed to come. Looking sown over the edge, a hundred, maybe two hundred meters below there appeared to be a fresh water stream running for miles in both directions. Fang kicked a loose stone out over the edge and jumped back as a fair size chunk of earth crumbled and fell down into the ravine breaking up as it went. He watched how it broke and fell, where pieces were landing.

Fang had wandered only fifteen twenty yards from where Gazzy had left him staring at the discoloured dirt where Max's phone had been recovered. He hadn't seen the ravine until he was on top of it. The sun being hot and high the way it was had something to do with it and in an hour or so it would be so dark that again you'd never see it. One of the others would have ended up walking right over the edge of it before the found it. Fang spread his wings wide, ignoring the twinge of pain in his shoulder as he did, with every intention of leaping over the edge to take a closer look down below. All along this edge where area that looked as though the earth gave way and fell in. It was too close to Max's last known where a bouts to rule out the possibility that she'd fallen in. He remembered the video he'd seen. It was also a possibility that she'd been thrown or slide over the edge trying to stop herself.

"Fang!" The sound of Iggy calling from somewhere behind him, made Fang step back from the edge and common sense kicked in. He ruffled his feathers a little frustrated; soon it would be too dark to search. Even with his raptor vison and he assumed the rest of the flock aside from Iggy had it too, it would still be too hard to see properly once he was over the cliff edge.

"Fang!" came Iggy's rather distressed call again, Fang gave his head a shake and turned from the ravine folding his wings neatly into his back again and headed in the direction of Iggy's voice. Every one of Fangs instincts told him with gut wrenching certainty that Max was down there somewhere, he wasn't sure how he knew, he was just certain that he did. Fang was standing almost directly in front of Iggy when he sucked in another breath and yelled for Fang again.

"Fang!"

"Yeah, Right here, Ig" Fang answered rubbing his ear. Iggy jumped in surprise, he wasn't expecting Fang to be as close as he was. Iggy sort of shrugged an apology for yelling so close.

"Gazzy said you've been out here all afternoon in the sun. Come back to camp rest for a bit. Eat something, drink something. Let Nudge have a look at that sunburn. The sun out here is brutal without any cover." Iggy said conversationally, Fang's hand flew to his face. He didn't feel sunburnt, and how would Iggy know anyway?

"What sun burn?" Fang asked just to be sure that his friend wasn't leading him on as they walked back towards camp.

"Just assumed you'd get one. Gasman and I both did after the first afternoon out here sifting through rubble without cover." Iggy said with a shrug.

"Oh, right" Fang said after a moment, realizing that both Iggy and Gazzy had very fair skin and light hair. The pair of them would burn easily before it would fade into a tan. Though one would think that with as much time as they spent flying around in the sun, it wouldn't be an issue, however it wasn't the first time they'd made interesting discoveries about themselves.

"Fang." Nudge greeted waving a hot dog on a stick at them as they approached the camp. Gazzy sort of half waved as he guzzled down an entire bottle of water.

"Hey guys." Fang greeted in return coming over to Nudge's little camp fire and sitting down, and for the first time that day remembered his backpack and side it off his shoulder.

"Find anything out there? You were gone all day."Nudge asked handing Iggy a stick and a packet of hotdogs as he sat down beside her. Fang dug out his water bottle and took a long drink, aware of everyone's eyes on him. They'd been waiting for him all week hoping he'd find something they had missed.

"Yeah I think so." He said after a moment. Iggy let out a sigh loading his stick with a hot dog, but Fang wasn't sure if it was in relief or in exasperation. Gazzy looked at him with his hot dog halfway to his mouth; Nudge slowly swallowed the bite she had just taken.

"I had a good look at the area where you guys found Max's things this afternoon."

"You said earlier that you thought there were drag marks out there, was that what they were or do you know that yet?" Gazzy asked

"I thought so Gaz, at first. Now I'm pretty sure they're skid marks, not drag marks." Fang answered

"You mean like the kind of marks you make in the dirt when you're playing baseball and slide into a base? 'Cause if that's what you mean, the really hurt when you do that, like they cause some seriously big bruises." Nudge started but stopped herself when everyone else looked at her. She flushed pink and offered Fang a stick and the packet of hot dogs. He took them realizing he was a lot hungrier then he thought he was.

"That's exactly what I mean Nudge." Fang said putting a couple of hot dogs on his stick before handing the packet over to Gazzy.

"So if she slid across the ground through the rubble as it was falling around her out there loosing things out of her pockets and what not, as she went, where'd she go?" Gazzy asked skewering a couple more hot dogs on his stick before passing the packet to Iggy.

"Well she was obviously thrown from the blast, but how far did she fall, or was she blown straight out from wherever she was standing at the time? That sort of determines how and where she may have ended up. I mean recoil and aftershock could be factors here too." Iggy said thoughtfully.

"She was thrown straight out from an in-flight position, but there's any number of things she could have crashed into or through to slow herself down." Fang said after a moment

"How do you know that?" Gazzy asked

"I saw videos from a couple recorded feeds, before everything collapsed."Fang admitted without telling them where the videos had come from, no one asked where he'd found the video either. Nudge could hack any computer imaginable but not necessarily navigate it after she was in, but Fang could find anything he was looking for without too much effort after he was into a computer. Nudge nodded her mouth too full of food to talk.

"So what do you think happened with the blow out then?" Iggy finally asked Nudge and Gazzy were quietly finishing their meal, waiting for Fang to answer. Fang took a bite of his hot dog chewing carefully. This is what he'd been out there doing all afternoon. Trying to figure out just what had happened. Fang took a moment to finish his food off and take another drink before getting into what most likely happened.

"First I need to know how long you guys have been out here looking." Fang asked

"Five weeks. Things weren't stable enough for anyone to be out here searching for anything for the first little while, and we were kind of hoping that she'd come back on her own that first week. If you check out the news they still say we're at risk for another shock wave and won't let search teams in for another two weeks." Nudge said, glancing at Iggy. Fang nodded.

"So it's not possible for someone else to have found her and moved her at all then." Fang said more to himself then to the others. Fang got a sort of faraway look on his face as he watched the fire. The others could almost see the thoughts piece themselves together behind his mind's eye.

"Well first thing you need to know is that there's a fairly deep ravine out there, not twenty feet from where Gazzy picked up her phone." Fang said letting the information sink in.

"How'd we miss that?" Gazzy asked looking at Nudge and Iggy before looking back at Fang.

"With the sun as hot and high as its been here, it's not surprising." Iggy said, Fang just nodded.

"The marks in the dirt show exactly what happened from the point she fell out of the air to where she went. There are no footprints out there aside from our own, so I'm fairly certain of my theory." Fang said and launched into his explanation on how Max would have hit the ground pretty hard, most likely unconscious and slid a good distance on her back, till the strap on her backpack let go, she'd have hit a good sized rock or piece of rubble and started to roll a little ways farther, loosing whatever was in her pockets. She would have stopped her tumbling to lie still close to ten feet from the edge of the ravine, but any weight that close to the edge would cause the earth to give way beneath her, taking her down into the ravine somewhere.


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer- Maximum Ride is a creation of James Patterson; I highly recommend reading his books

Maximum Ride

Beginning from the End

Chapter IV- Shifted

Something shifted over above me somewhere, I felt the stone shift around me, wait a minute stone? Little pebbles were dropping down onto my back and splashing into the water that was now chest high all around me the sounds echoing in my head. I felt the air change too; it was fresher within minutes of the shift in the rock, as if there was now a hole somewhere in my little cavern. This thought should have inspired hope in just about anyone else in my current situation. Nope! Not me. I still couldn't see anything other than an inky blackness; I still couldn't move any part of my body at all. Prior to the shift in the rock I was having a hard time breathing as well, but I guess that's to be expected with a ton of rock pressing down on what were probably broken ribs into my chest cavity. Really all that's changed here is that now I won't have to worry about running out of oxygen before I drown down here, and I had at some point fairly recently come to the conclusion that I was for some inconceivable reason buried alive. I was long beyond the point of hope and long past the point of caring. I had already resigned myself to what was turning out to be a rather long wait, even if it was for eternity here in this dark wet hole, for my death to come.

Then all at once everything changed, I wasn't sure if it was for the good yet or not. I heard something other than the water rising and my own ragged breaths, something other than the rocks falling into the water echoing around me. I could suddenly hear someone talking over me, I could hear words, it was muffled and incomprehensible and I couldn't hear well considering where I was, but I could hear someone else aside from myself talking to someone else somewhere close by. The wheels in my mind began to turn again; I had to get out of here. I still had something I had to do. More rocks shifted over me and fell; these were not small pebbles anymore. A fist sized rock came down on my head, catching me in the temple. Within seconds I felt the blood flow, well this was different, and it was hot in contrast to the rest of my body, burning as it ran down my face and into my eye. Something snapped just then and I remembered everything. My eyes snapped open and I took in the deepest breath I possibly could considering the ton of rock working against my lungs that had collapsed on top of me, and then I screamed at the top of my lungs for all I was worth, in the loudest highest pitch I could muster and carried it for as long as I could possibly hold it. I didn't remember shouting anything in particular I was just making as much noise as I possibly could. I prayed silently that I wouldn't cause an avalanche with the sudden resounding noise I was causing. My poor ears were ringing after nothing but silence.

I could move again, to some extent anyway, but I didn't dare move a whole lot, despite the falling rock as I realized that half of my body was pinned between a rock and a hard place. As I wiggled a little to get my bearings straight it dawned on me that there was a chance that I may have impaled myself on something when I fell out of the sky. I waited quietly against every survival instinct I had that was screaming right back at me, waiting for some sign that whoever had been talking outside of my not so little hole had heard my screaming, before I drew another deep breath and started all over again.

Fang and Iggy had been searching the rock falls in the chasm all morning with very little luck, they'd only just stopped to discuss were to look next when Iggy suddenly put up a hand to shush Fang. Fang glanced up the cliff face above them to where Nudge and Gazzy were checking out caved in crevices and ledges cut into the rock while Iggy continued to listen for whatever it was he thought he'd heard.

"Screaming?" Iggy muttered trying to pin-point where the noise was coming from

"What?" Fang asked his head whipping around to watch Iggy.

"Some ones screaming." Iggy said. It only took a second to realize the pair of them were standing on one of the rock falls that could have possibly buried Max, and if she were screaming, then she was alive, and knew someone was where they could hear her scream. Max was too smart to waste energy uselessly in a crisis situation. Instantly fang was on his hands and knees clearing rock and debris, and Iggy was shouting for Nudge and Gazzy to come down from the cliff face to help. Fang was throwing rocks over his shoulder and rolling boulders between his feet down off the pile, as the kids landed and instantly started to clear the rock with him.

"Max!" Fang yelled when there was a break in the shouting he could now hear too, coming from below them. "Max!" Getting no answer they continued clearing the debris as quickly as they could. It wasn't long before the screaming and shouting started again, this time was different, this time was muffled words drifting up to them, Max defiantly had some choice words for whatever she was trying to say. Fang and Iggy rolled a large boulder away just as the screaming died away again, and Fang peered down into the dark hole through the dank damp gloom.

"Max!" he shouted down again.

"Here! I'm down here!" Came a weakening reply.

"Max!" Iggy shouted down into the hole

"Get me out of here!" came the agitated voice from the bottom of the hole, echoing all the way up from the bottom of the gloom. Fang wasted very little time setting to work to make the opening big enough to fit through.

"Hey!" came an indignant protest when he knocked a rock the size of a baseball into the hole when he moved a larger rock out of his way. They all heard the splash at the bottom, and looked at one another realizing that Max could be in a worse situation then they could have imagined.

"Sorry, Get out of the way, I'm liable to knock more rock loose coming down." He yelled down to her.

"If I could I would!" came the response. Fang looked up feeling eyes watching him, he met Gazzy's haunted gaze

"What's she mean by that?" he asked quietly.

"Well she was buried alive Gazzy, it's been nearly two months that she's been down there. There's a chance that she's got broken bones, or pinned under something, or half buried or-" Nudge started but was cut off by a look from Iggy.

"Or all of the above and worse. That's enough Nudge, we found her, and we'll deal with whatever the issue is when we get there." Iggy said nodding at Fang.

"I'm going down to see what's going on down there." Fang said tucking a flashlight into his belt and positioning himself over the hole.

"Be careful." Gazzy said Fang nodded.

"You guys keep clearing the rock away, this holes going to have to be bigger for both of us to get through." Fang said lowering himself into the hole.


End file.
